Systems are known that monitor a resident within a home as part of a home monitoring system. One such system has been disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 6,402,691 B1 entitled “In-Home Patient Monitoring System issued Jun. 11, 2002. These systems save costs by physiological testing of the person and transmitting that information to a remote monitoring location. In addition, these systems can include an automated call function. Questions can be asked relative to the resident's condition and medications. Another such system has been disclosed in U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/956,681, filed Oct. 1, 2004. The '681 application has been assigned to the assignee hereof and is incorporated herein by reference.
Known systems rely upon the resident having the mobility to use the system. This includes answering any telephone query that is automatically generated on a periodic basis. In some cases, these queries can be less than daily depending on the condition of the resident and his/her medications.
In a home monitoring system, a resident is monitored for physiological and other conditions indicative of health and well-being. The physiological monitoring can include the person's vital signs such as weight, blood pressure, pulse rate and oxygen saturation. The system may also incorporate medication control to support the health and well-being of the resident.
In the event that the physiological monitoring determines that an emergency situation is prevalent or the physiological measurement is not completed as scheduled or the medication is not taken as prescribed, a call can be initiated to a remote monitoring facility to provide an alert. The remote monitoring facility can respond by calling the resident or patient or by visiting the person. However, the follow-up call may find that no one answers the phone and therefore a visit is scheduled for a later time.
The resident may not be answering the phone because he/she went outside, could not hear the phone ring, or was not able to respond. Other reasons for not being able to respond include, the person fell down and cannot get up, or, had an earlier emergency and is now incapacitated or unavailable at the scheduled time. Because the cause is not certain, a routine follow-up call may be made. It therefore becomes extremely important to initiate a call at the first sign of an abnormal situation. Otherwise, a person that falls could be down for a very long time and need assistance. The person might also miss vital medications or monitoring.
There are also systems wherein the resident carries a device that can be activated send a signal for help if he/she falls or become demobilized. However, these systems rely upon the person having the transmitting device on their person at the time of the emergency. It is possible if not likely that the resident will remove the device and forget to put it back on under certain circumstances such as bathing, sleeping, or changing clothing. This raises the potential that the resident may not be able to summon help when demobilized by falling or by other reasons.
Therefore, there exists a need for improved systems for summoning help in situations where time can be important to survival or relief of discomfort.